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There is a widespread perception that China’s digital censorship distances its people from the global internet, and the Chinese Communist Party, through state-controlled media, is the main gatekeeper of information about foreign affairs. Our analysis of narratives about the Russo-Ukrainian War circulating on the Chinese social media platform Weibo challenges this view. Comparing narratives on Weibo with 8.26 million unique news articles from 2,500 of some of the most trafficked websites in China, Russia, Ukraine, and the United States (totaling 10,000 sites), we find that Russian news websites published more articles matching narratives found on Weibo than news websites from China, Ukraine, or the United States. Similarly, a plurality of Weibo narratives were most associated with narratives found on Russian news websites while less than ten percent were most associated with narratives from Chinese news sites. Narratives later appearing on Weibo were more likely to first appear on Russian rather than Chinese, Ukrainian, or US news websites, and Russian websites were highly influential for narratives appearing on Weibo. Altogether, these results show that Chinese state media was not the main gatekeeper of information about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine for Weibo users.

Journal Publisher
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Authors
Hans W.A. Hanley
Yingdan Lu
Jennifer Pan
Jennifer Pan
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Skyline Scholars Seminar Series


Tuesday, April 29, 2025 | 12:00 pm -1:20 pm Pacific Time
Goldman Room E409, Encina Hall, 616 Jane Stanford Way



The Origin and Diffusion of Policy Ideas in China


Drawing on two decades of Chinese policy documents and government work reports, we document over 116,000 distinct policy ideas and trace their complete life cycles. Our analysis reveals three main findings. First, in the 2000s, policy innovation was highly decentralized—more than 80% of ideas originated from local governments, driven primarily by local officials. Second, after 2013, the central government shifted its incentives by ceasing rewards for bottom-up innovation and instead promoting the diligent enforcement of centrally assigned policies, leading to significant centralization of policy innovation. Third, focusing on industrial policies, we highlight tradeoffs between centralization and decentralization. Top-down industrial policies tend to be less aligned with local comparative advantages and are less effective at spurring industrial growth, revealing the cost of centralization. Conversely, under decentralization, strategic competition among local politicians can distort policy diffusion, reducing the fit between policies and local contexts and undermining their effectiveness. Quantitatively, our results indicate that since 2013, the costs of centralizing policy innovation in China have far outweighed its benefits.

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About the Speaker 
 

Shaoda Wang headshot

Shaoda Wang is an Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, a Skyline Scholar (2024-2025) at the Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions (SCCEI), a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), and an affiliate of the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis in Development (BREAD). He also serves as the deputy faculty director of the China branches of the Becker Friedman Institute for Economics (BFI-China) and the Energy Policy Institute at UChicago (EPIC-China). He is an applied economist with research interests in development economics, environmental economics, and political economy, with a regional focus on China. He holds a BA from Peking University and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. Prior to joining Harris, he was a Postdoctoral Scholar in the Department of Economics and Energy Policy Institute (EPIC) at the University of Chicago.

Interested in meeting with Professor Wang one-on-one? 
Sign up to speak with him during his office hours: 
Select Tuesdays | 2:00-3:30 PM 

Please schedule a meeting in advance and use your Stanford email to log in. 



Questions? Contact Xinmin Zhao at xinminzhao@stanford.edu
 


Goldman Room E409, Encina Hall

Shaoda Wang, Skyline Scholar; Assistant Professor, University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy
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Read the article originally published on the Stanford Impact Labs website. 

"Early childhood development (ECD) delays affect an estimated 250 million children under the age of five in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), leading to lower educational attainment, reduced lifetime earnings, and perpetuation of poverty cycles. In rural China, nearly 50% of children aged 0-5 experience developmental delays, underscoring the urgent need for effective, scalable interventions. Over the past decade, the Rural Education Action Program (REAP) has been at the forefront of addressing these challenges through targeted ECD research and intervention programs, successfully raising government awareness and influencing policy in China.

Our project seeks to build upon REAP's achievements by developing a comprehensive, adaptive mobile application that integrates three evidence-based programs: a parenting stimulation program, a maternal and child health curriculum, and a caregiver mental health intervention. Each program has demonstrated significant positive outcomes in rural China, enhancing cognitive, language, motor, social-emotional, and mental health development. Our key partnerships with Sichuan University and Zhongnan University of Economics and Law further strengthen our efforts by providing academic expertise and local insights..." Continue Reading

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Two young school girls stand shoulder to shoulder smiling at school in China.
News

China's Human Capital Dilemma

Scott Rozelle answers questions about China's human capital dilemma in the Summer 2024 edition of INSIGHT, the journal of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai.
China's Human Capital Dilemma
A busy train station in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, China.
News

Common Prosperity Should Start Early

Dorien Emmers, former SCCEI Postdoc, and Scott Rozelle, SCCEI Co-Director, wrote a piece featured in China Daily and The China Story highlighting the challenges of inequality and a possible path towards common prosperity.
Common Prosperity Should Start Early
Jennifer Pan presents during a SCCEI lecture held on October 3, 2024.
News

Jennifer Pan Shares Research Insights on Disguised Repression in China

Why do authoritarian regimes charge political opponents with non-political crimes when they can levy charges directly related to opponents' political activism? Professor Pan presents her newest research during a Fall 2024 SCCEI event.
Jennifer Pan Shares Research Insights on Disguised Repression in China
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With support from the Stanford Impact Labs, the Rural Education Action Program is developing an app-based integrated early childhood development program for rural China.

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Visiting Scholar, Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
Professor, Dean, School of Economics and Management, Ningxia University
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Ph.D.

Guotao Yang is Professor and Dean of the School of Economics and Management at Ningxia University. He is also an appointed Visiting Scholar at the Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions in 2025. 

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Visiting Postdoctoral Scholar, Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
Postdoctoral Fellow, Peking University
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Yi Cui is a Visiting Postdoctoral Scholar at Stanford University. She obtained her Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics and Management from the College of Economics and Management at China Agricultural University in 2023. Currently, she is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the School of Advanced Agricultural Sciences at Peking University. Her research interests lie in the field of development economics, with a focus on food consumption, nutrition, and health among rural populations in China.

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Visiting Scholar, Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
Associate Professor, West China School of Public Health, Sichuan University
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Ph.D.

Yuju Wu is an Associate Professor at the West China School of Public Health at Sichuan University. She is in residence at Stanford as an appointed Visiting Scholar with the Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions in 2025.

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Encina Hall, East Wing, Room E411

Office Hours:
Select Fridays | 2:30-4:30 PM 
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Chair Professor, Koguan School of Law, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Skyline Scholar (2025), Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
quanxi_gao.jpg
Ph.D.

Professor Gao Quanxi is a distinguished Chair Professor and the Director of the Center for Constitutional and National Governance at KoGuan School of Law, Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

Prior to his current role, Professor Gao held several notable academic positions, including Prime Professor and Dean at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities & Social Sciences at Beihang University (2011–2016), and Research Professor at the Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (2004–2008).

Professor Gao earned his PhD in Philosophy from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in 1988. His research interests encompass Constitutional Theory and History, Political and Legal Philosophy, and the History of Western Legal and Political Thoughts.

Among his significant publications are Political Constitution and Future Constitutionalism in China (2016), Outlines of Chinese Jurisprudence of Political Constitution (2014), and Intellectual Monument Mark: Lectures on History of Western Political Thoughts (2012). In recent years, Professor Gao has published Ten Lectures on Scottish Moral Philosophy(2023), Modern Western Political Thought (2023) and Shakespeare’s History Plays & the British Monarchy (2024).

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Join us for a compelling discussion on the evolving challenges and strategies shaping China’s economy and its impact on global industrial policy. During this panel discussion, Skyline Scholars Loren Brandt from the University of Toronto and Xiaonian Xu from the China Europe International Business School, as well as Senior Fellow Mary Lovely from the Peterson Institute for International Economics will explore the slowdown of China’s economy and the structural reforms needed to address its debt and growth challenges. Scott Rozelle, Co-Director of the Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions, will moderate the discussion. Panelists will examine the shifting role of industrial policy in China, its strategic and economic motivations, and its broader effects on China’s long-term trajectory, as well as how China’s policies influence U.S. policy decisions, including the role of industrial policy in an era of increasing global competition.

The discussion will begin with opening remarks at 3:15 pm on Wednesday, February 26th. We invite you to join us before the event for light refreshments.


About the Speakers
 

Loren Brandt headshot

Loren Brandt is the Noranda Chair Professor of Economics at the University of Toronto specializing in the Chinese economy. He is also a research fellow at the IZA (The Institute for the Study of Labor) in Bonn, Germany. He has published widely on the Chinese economy in leading economic journals and been involved in extensive household and enterprise survey work in both China and Vietnam. With Thomas Rawski, he completed Policy, Regulation, and Innovation in China’s Electricity and Telecom Industries (Cambridge University Press, 2019), an interdisciplinary effort analyzing the effect of government policy on the power and telecom sectors in China. He was also co-editor and major contributor to China’s Great Economic Transformation (Cambridge University Press, 2008), which provides an integrated analysis of China’s unexpected economic boom of the past three decades. Brandt was also one of the area editors for Oxford University Press’ five-volume Encyclopedia of Economic History (2003). His current research focuses on issues of entrepreneurship and firm dynamics, industrial policy and innovation and  economic growth and structural change.

 

Mary Lovely headshot

Mary E. Lovely is the Anthony M. Solomon Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute. She served as the 2022 Carnegie Chair in US-China Relations with the Kluge Center at the Library of Congress. Lovely is professor emeritus of economics at Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, where she was Melvin A. Eggers Economics Faculty Scholar from 2010 to April 2022. She was coeditor of the China Economic Review during 2011–15.

Her current research projects investigate the effect of China's foreign direct investment policies on trade flows and entry mode, strategic reform of US tariffs on China, and recent movements in global supply chains. Lovely earned her PhD in economics at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and a master's degree in city and regional planning from Harvard University.

 

Headshot of Scott Rozelle

Scott Rozelle is the Helen F. Farnsworth Senior Fellow and the co-director of Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research at Stanford University. He received his BS from the University of California, Berkeley, and his MS and PhD from Cornell University. His research focuses almost exclusively on China and is concerned with: agricultural policy, including the supply, demand, and trade in agricultural projects; the emergence and evolution of markets and other economic institutions in the transition process and their implications for equity and efficiency; and the economics of poverty and inequality, with an emphasis on rural education, health and nutrition.

In recognition of his outstanding achievements, Rozelle has received numerous honors and awards, including the Friendship Award in 2008, the highest award given to a non-Chinese by the Premier; and the National Science and Technology Collaboration Award in 2009 for scientific achievement in collaborative research.

 

Xiaonian Xu headshot

Dr. Xiaonian Xu is Professor Emeritus at CEIBS, where he held the position of Professor of Economics and Finance from 2004 to 2018. In recognition of his contributions, he was named an Honorary Professor in Economics from September 2018 to August 2023.

Dr. Xu earned his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California, Davis, in 1991, and an MA in Industrial Economics from the People's University of China in 1981. In 1996, he was awarded the distinguished Sun Yefang Economics Prize, the highest honor in the field in China, for his research on China’s capital markets. His research interests include Macroeconomics, Financial Institutions and Financial Markets, Transitional Economies, China’s Economic Reform, Corporate Strategy and Digital Transformation. His publications include: Freedom and Market Economy, There has Never been A Savior, China: Market Economy or Planned Economy, the Nature of the Business and the Internet, and the Nature of the Business and the Internet, 2nd Edition.

A dedicated educator, he has been recognized with the CEIBS Teaching Excellence Award in 2005 and 2006, as well as the esteemed CEIBS Medal for Teaching Excellence in 2010.

Scott Rozelle
Scott Rozelle


Encina Hall, William J. Perry Room C231
616 Jane Stanford Way

This event will be held in-person only, registration is required.

Encina Hall, East Wing, Room 413

Office Hours:
Select Wednesdays | 2:00-5:00 PM 
Please schedule a meeting in advance

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Skyline Scholar (2025), Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
Professor of Economics, Noranda Chair in Economics and International Trade, University of Toronto
Research Fellow, IZA
loren_brandt_-_bg_remove.png
PhD

Loren Brandt is the Noranda Chair Professor of Economics at the University of Toronto specializing in the Chinese economy. He is also a research fellow at the IZA (The Institute for the Study of Labor) in Bonn, Germany. He has published widely on the Chinese economy in leading economic journals and been involved in extensive household and enterprise survey work in both China and Vietnam. With Thomas Rawski, he completed Policy, Regulation, and Innovation in China’s Electricity and Telecom Industries (Cambridge University Press, 2019), an interdisciplinary effort analyzing the effect of government policy on the power and telecom sectors in China. He was also co-editor and major contributor to China’s Great Economic Transformation (Cambridge University Press, 2008), which provides an integrated analysis of China’s unexpected economic boom of the past three decades. Brandt was also one of the area editors for Oxford University Press’ five-volume Encyclopedia of Economic History (2003). His current research focuses on issues of entrepreneurship and firm dynamics, industrial policy and innovation and  economic growth and structural change.

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Loren Brandt
Mary Lovely

Encina Hall, East Wing, Room 014

Office Hours:
Select Mondays | 3:00-5:00 PM 
Please schedule a meeting in advance

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Skyline Scholar (2024), Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
Professor of Economics and Finance, China Europe International Business School
prof._xu_xiaonian.jpg
Ph.D.

Dr. Xiaonian Xu is Professor Emeritus at CEIBS, where he held the position of Professor of Economics and Finance from 2004 to 2018. In recognition of his contributions, he was named an Honorary Professor in Economics from September 2018 to August 2023.

Between 1999 and 2004, Dr. Xu served as Managing Director and Head of Research at China International Capital Corporation Limited (CICC). Before joining CICC, he was a Senior Economist at Merrill Lynch Asia Pacific, based in Hong Kong from 1997 to 1998, and worked as a World Bank consultant in Washington DC in 1996. Dr. Xu was appointed Assistant Professor of Amherst College, Massachusetts, where he taught Economics and Financial Markets from 1991 to 1995. Earlier in his career, he was a research fellow at the State Development Research Centre of China from 1981 to 1985.

Dr. Xu earned his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California, Davis, in 1991, and an MA in Industrial Economics from the People's University of China in 1981. In 1996, he was awarded the distinguished Sun Yefang Economics Prize, the highest honor in the field in China, for his research on China’s capital markets. His research interests include Macroeconomics, Financial Institutions and Financial Markets, Transitional Economies, China’s Economic Reform, Corporate Strategy and Digital Transformation. His publication includes: Freedom and Market Economy, There has Never been A Savior, China: Market Economy or Planned Economy, the Nature of the Business and the Internet, and the Nature of the Business and the Internet, 2nd Edition.

A dedicated educator, he has been recognized with the CEIBS Teaching Excellence Award in 2005 and 2006, as well as the esteemed CEIBS Medal for Teaching Excellence in 2010.

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Xiaonian Xu
Panel Discussions
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Skyline Scholars Seminar Series


Tuesday, February 4, 2025 | 1:00 pm -2:30 pm Pacific Time
Goldman Room E409, Encina Hall, 616 Jane Stanford Way



The Anatomy of Chinese Innovation: Insights on Patent Quality and Ownership


In this study we look at the evolution of patenting in China from 1985-2019. We develop a new method to measure the importance of an individual patent for innovation based on the use of a Large Language Model to process patent text data and a new theory of the innovation process. We also classify patent ownership using a comprehensive business registry. We highlight three insights. First, patents that are important for innovation have become less important on average. Second, knowledge within China has become more important than knowledge outside of China for directing innovation in China. Finally, knowledge produced by Chinese entities within China has become more important than knowledge produced by foreign entities.

Please register for the event to receive email updates and add it to your calendar.



About the Speaker 
 

Loren Brandt headshot

Loren Brandt is the Noranda Chair Professor of Economics at the University of Toronto specializing in the Chinese economy. He is also a research fellow at the IZA (The Institute for the Study of Labor) in Bonn, Germany. He has published widely on the Chinese economy in leading economic journals and been involved in extensive household and enterprise survey work in both China and Vietnam. With Thomas Rawski, he completed Policy, Regulation, and Innovation in China’s Electricity and Telecom Industries (Cambridge University Press, 2019), an interdisciplinary effort analyzing the effect of government policy on the power and telecom sectors in China. He was also co-editor and major contributor to China’s Great Economic Transformation (Cambridge University Press, 2008), which provides an integrated analysis of China’s unexpected economic boom of the past three decades. Brandt was also one of the area editors for Oxford University Press’ five-volume Encyclopedia of Economic History (2003). His current research focuses on issues of entrepreneurship and firm dynamics, industrial policy and innovation and  economic growth and structural change.

Interested in meeting with Professor Brandt one-on-one? 
Sign up to speak with him during his office hours: 
Wednesday, 1/29 or 2/12 | 2:00-5:00 PM 

Please schedule a meeting in advance and use your Stanford email to log in. 



Questions? Contact Xinmin Zhao at xinminzhao@stanford.edu
 


Goldman Room E409, Encina Hall

Loren Brandt, Skyline Scholar; Professor of Economics, University of Toronto
Seminars
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Encina Hall, East Wing, Room E011

Office Hours:
Select Mondays | 3:00-5:00 PM 
Please schedule a meeting in advance

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Professor of Political Science, Fudan University
Skyline Scholar (2025), Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
gangsheng_bao.jpeg
Ph.D.

Gangsheng Bao is a Professor of Political Science at the School of International Relations and Public Affairs, Fudan University, Shanghai, China. He is also currently appointed as a Skyline Scholar at the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions, Stanford University.

Professor Bao earned his Ph.D. from Peking University in 2012. His research interests include political theory, comparative politics, and political history, with a particular focus on theories of political modernization and democratization. He has published numerous journal articles and authored several books. His major works include: The Fate of Civilization States: From Political Crisis to Modernization (2024), Political Evolution: From Ancient Times to the 21st Century (2023), Crises and Solutions: Reflections on Political Thought in Early China (2023), Politics of Democratic Breakdown (English version, 2022; Chinese version, 2014), The Logic of Democracy (2018), and The Common Sense of Modern Politics (2015).

Professor Bao’s book Politics of Democratic Breakdown was awarded the "Best Social Science Book of the Year" in 2014 by The Beijing News and was listed among the “Nineteen Recommended Chinese Books of the Year” in 2014 by The New York Times (International Chinese Network). In 2023, Political Evolution: From Ancient Times to the 21st Century was honored as one of the “Ten Best Chinese Original Books in Humanities and Social Sciences of the Year” by Tencent and as one of the “Ten Best Books of the Year” by The China Business Network. Similarly, The Fate of Civilization States: From Political Crisis to Modernization was selected as one of the “Ten Best Books of the Year” in 2024 by the Nanfang Daily. Additionally, his work The Logic of Democracy earned him the title of "Best Author of the Year" in 2018 from The Economic Observer.

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